The Manual de Plantas de Costa Rica is a Spanish-language guide to all the species of native, naturalized, and commercially cultivated seed plants known to occur in Costa Rica.Featured throughout are identification keys, concise descriptions, distribution summaries, and brief diagnostic discussions, plus at least one illustration for nearly every genus.

Costa Rica is a small country of ca. 51,000 km2, located in southern Central America between Nicaragua, to the north, and Panama, to the east.Considering its size, Costa Rica is remarkably diverse topographically. The landscape is dominated by a northwest-to-southeast aligned chain of four major cordilleras, forming the Continental Divide, and flanked on either side by coastal lowlands studded with outlying peaks and ridges. The Caribbean coast is relatively uniform, unbroken by significant inlets or peninsulas. The Pacific coast is more varied in this regard, with three major peninsulas, each sheltering an important gulf.The Caribbean slope is, on the whole, more continuously rainy, especially from April through January, peaking from November through January.On the Pacific slope, the rainy season extends from April or May to November, peaking in September and October, with virtually no rain during the northern winter.

Geographic coordinates, elevation, and other important data on towns and toponyms, with an emphasis on localities of botanical significance, can be found in the Manual gazetteer at: